Cruising the Caribbean
Deborah, Greg, Jess, Kevin, Lila and Pa |
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We recently completed a cruise to
the Caribbean Islands aboard Royal Caribbean’s Grandeur of the
Sea with our three grandchildren, Greg, Kevin and Jessica and
our daughter, Deborah. Anticipating ten days aboard
the ship with three teenagers left us with some anxiety as we
prepared to depart for our journey. The positive aspect of
this portion of our journey was that the ship was departing from
Baltimore, just an easy forty minute drive from our house.
I will not concentrate or comment much about
our itinerary....traveling in the Caribbean is familiar to many people
and the port visits were singularly not earth shattering.
Freeport in the Grand Bahamas was unimpressive, as was our visit to Port
Everglades in Florida, which was really a provisioning port for the
ship... food, mattresses, food, shower curtains, food and I am sure some
other goodies as well.
Our visit to Key West, Florida and the Royal
Caribbean private island of CocoCay were both very nice especially as
they required little time and effort to reach our point of interest
after leaving the ship. The port visit to Cozumel, Mexico was also
interesting as we rode a semi-submersible boat to a coral reef for some
fish watching, but the singular factor common to all the port visits was
the heat coupled with excessive humidity. Well DUH!!...”What do
you expect in the middle of summer in the Caribbean?” I was told.
Every
aspect of the cruise experience relative to the ship was just
excellent...it is the cruise line that knows how to cater to the needs
and wants of families....the children loved it. Since Royal
Caribbean focuses on families, their core customer age is in the
thirties and forties and the shipboard activities are directed toward
that crowd.
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But this
trip for us was all about Greg, Jessica and Kevin so this is their story.
Kevin is almost fifteen years old, Greg is sixteen years old and Jessica
is almost seventeen years old......these are teenagers who have tasted
life and knew what they wanted every step of the way. Each readily
dressed for evening dinner without any pressure on our part and they all
enjoyed the great shows in the theatre each evening.
Jessica
is a charming, determined teenager, who knew immediately which programs
she wanted to experience. She is extremely expressive and definitely
knows her own mind, so when the opportunity to meet other teenagers who
would be traveling on the ship presented itself, Jessica was an eager and
willing participant.
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Greg
really wanted to get involved with the teen programs, but he was somewhat
reticent to get involved on his own. And in that regard, Jessica was an
inspiration who encouraged Greg to get involved and he shortly became an
enthusiastic devotee.
Teen parties beginning at midnight was the big thing...a chance for
teens (age 15 through 17 years) to meet, talk and dance under the
watchful eye of a chaperone from the ship. Friendships are easily
and readily realized that would seem to last forever...well, at least
until the end of the cruise. Kevin, a bit too young for this
scene, had just not arrived at that point yet and did not get involved
in the late night teen parties, but it did not stop him from getting
involved in other shipboard activities.
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The
first night Jessica and Greg went to the teen party...the opening event.
Here they would meet and greet each other and make those lasting
relationships that would enable them to acknowledge each other anywhere on
the ship as part of that “secret” society. “Who was that?” I would ask
when they greeted some other teen....”Oh, just somebody I know” Jessica or
Greg would reply.
When I
was sitting in the hot tub with all three of the kids on the second day of
the cruise, a group of teens as they were walking by said “Are you going
to the party later?” I responded with “Are you talking to me?” Thinking
that I was being funny, I received only blank stares from all present.
No need to do that again.
So the
routine was for the family to gather for dinner and a show at which time
the children would put Lila and me to bed before they headed out for the
evening. Of course they would come into our cabin some time during the
night to tell us when they were ready to get some sleep. And sleep they
did, for they were often not up before about 11:30am, just in time for an
early lunch.
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At that
time we would learn just a smattering of the exciting details of their
activities the night before. Of course, after lunch they would often
catch a nap, just in time to get up once again a little later when we
would visit the hot tubs and/or the pool. By then it was time to dress
for dinner and repeat the whole process once more. |
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Port Lucaya, Freeport, Bahamas |

CocoCay, Bahamas |
After
just a few days I was quite bothered by this routine...they were missing
all the great fun on the ship....shuffleboard, ping-pong, etc. How could
they ruin their vacations by sleeping all day? I asked then to get to
bed earlier, so we could rise earlier and do things!!!! Well, it seemed
like I had missed the whole picture.
Going to
the parties and dancing and talking to all hours of the night was the fun
thing to do....to talk for hours after the party and order French fries
from room service at 2:00am was the fun thing to do and when they would
get out of bed around noon after some probing, well, that was fun. So
here I was missing the whole scene...we were just on different schedules.
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Cozumel, Mexico |
By the third day I had it down perfectly....they would play when we slept
and we would play or rather just wait around while they slept. And they
had a great time ....Jessica, Greg and Kevin had a ball doing all they
wanted to do on this cruise and they even took in some sightseeing and
shopping as well. |
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Lila,
Deborah and I, enjoyed ourselves as well. As I said earlier, the ship was
great, the food was excellent and we were able to watch the three
teenagers have the time of their lives. |
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CocoCay, Bahamas |
Cozumel, Mexico in a semi-
submersible boat |
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